In the manufacture of aluminum cans it is customary to feed a continuous strip of aluminum to a punch press which forms shallow cup shaped blanks from a strip. The shallow cup shaped blanks are then used in a body maker machine which pushes the shallow cup shaped blanks through can forming and ironing dies to elongate and shape the shallow cup shaped blanks into can bodies. The foregoing operations require substantial contacting relationships between apparatus and the aluminum material. Therefore, it is necessary to apply a lubricating material to each side of the continuous strip of aluminum prior to feeding it into the punch press. One conventional method of applying such lubricating material to the continuous strip of aluminum is to pull the continuous strip of aluminum through a bath of lubricating material and squeeze off any excess lubricating material.